Key West Trip Details
I figured that, instead of telling the same trip story over and over, I'd just post it here and be done with it. Enjoy.
Kevin and I went to Key West, Florida last weekend. In case you don't know, Key West is the Southern-most island off the coast (way off) of Florida. It's situated so that the West side of the island is on the Gulf of Mexico and the East side is on the Atlantic side. (See map) The water is a beautiful turquoise, clear blue.
We were able to fly, using some of Kevin's Continental miles, so we flew from Houston to Tampa, then (via the smallest plane I've been on in a long time) onto Key West. Since we flew directly onto the island, we didn't have to rent a car, which was the wisest decision we made. We took a cab from the airport to our hotel and from then on, we just walked everywhere or took our rented moped. The island is so small that a car really isn't necessary and parking is a pain anyway.
We stayed at a nice little bed and breakfast called Duval House. It is located right on the main drag of Key West, Duval street. We had a great room with a huge balcony, overlooking Duval street, which made for some interesting people watching, especially in the wee hours of the night, when the drunks were out and about. Duval house also has a nice pool that was wonderful to come back to, during the heat of day, to rinse off and float around in.
In all honesty, we didn't do a whole heck of a lot while in Key West. Typically, we'd get up every morning, go and grab a quick breakfast out by the pool at Duval House and then venture out to shop around or go to the beach (which is man-made, but really nice and clean). When it was time to eat, we'd venture down Duval Street to find a place to grab some grub and a drink (Hey, we were on vacation! It's totally acceptable to begin drinking at 11am--that's the rule!). We frequented an Irish pub called Irish Kevin's daily which is a guitar bar...similar to a piano bar, with a musician who plays silly songs and engages the audience in debauchery. On our first day in Key West, we were walking past Irish Kevin's, which is also sort of an open-air place. We were standing on the sidewalk outside, listening to the guitar player when, all of a sudden, what seemed like the entire audience turned around to us, out on the sidewalk and (along with the musician on his booming microphone) said, "COME ON IN!". We sheepishly took them up on the offer and grabbed a table. We came to learn that the whole "come on in" thing happens very frequently and it's also fun to be on the inside of the joke (and thus, inside the pub) when it happens. We also learned that typically the singer on stage will say something off color and rude about the people who choose not to come inside and run quickly down the sidewalk, embarrassed.
We also enjoyed Sloppy Joe's which is one of the oldest bars on the island and was one of Ernest Hemingway's favorite hangouts when he lived in Key West. We went to Willie T's, which had the best food, I think. We tried to eat at Margaritaville, just to say that we did (because we figured that everyone would ask us if we went there) but there was a wait for a table and we didn't feel like it was worth the wait. We didn't eat at The Hog's Breath Saloon but we enjoyed the atmosphere there.
Every evening we went down to Mallory Square, which is the premier place to watch the sunset. There are jugglers, artists, etc down there as well as some live music. The sunsets were beautiful and the vibe was really cool down there, with everyone there to celebrate the sunset.
As far as sight-seeing, the only thing that was written on my list with a Sharpie marker was to go to Hemingway House. The house is pretty but I mainly wanted to see the cats. I was so excited to walk onto the property and immediately see Charlie Chaplin walking around! He's the most-photographed cat at Hemingway House. We learned that about 50% of the 50-60 cats at Hemingway House are polydactyls (have extra toes). I thought it was really interesting to find out that most cats at Hemingway House live to be well over 20 years old! There's a vet that comes every Wednesday to check up on everyone; the cats' food is donated by Eukanuba and all but a few cats are spayed and neutered. The folks at Hemingway House like to have a couple of litters of kittens each year, to keep the population constant. While Kevin and I were walking around the grounds, we came upon an awful-looking cat, laying in the bushes. He was an orange tabby that couldn't have weighed more than 5 lbs or so. He was dirty, matted and flies and gnats were buzzing all around him. I had to watch his chest and belly carefully to make sure that he was breathing, because he looked like a really dead cat to me. My faith and excitement about the Hemingway cats was wavering. During our tour of the grounds with a tour guide, he took the time to talk about some of the cats that live there and introduce us to the ones that were tagging along on our tour. It was at this time that he told us about one of the oldest cats on the property (I can't remember his name), but he described him as an orange tabby who looked like he's lost a battle with a weedwacker and then been thrown in the pool--which perfectly described the poor, sad cat that we'd seen in the bushes. Turns out that this cat is around 25 years old, which would make him 140 in human years! The tour guide assured us that the cat isn't in any pain--just that he's in his twilight years and sleeps most of the time. This made me feel much better.
Another cool place that we'd heard about and wanted to see was The Chicken Store. There are tons of chickens that live on Key West. They've been there for hundreds of years and roam about freely. Most people in Key West tolerate the chickens, but many do not and want them eradicated from the island. The Chicken Store is run by people who rescue the chickens of Key West. All of the proceeds from The Chicken Store go to the care and upkeep of the chickens on Key West. I personally, loved seeing the chickens around the island. We saw one mother chicken, with her 3 little baby chicks following closely behind; at Hog's Breath, while sitting there listening to a great live musician, we heard the cock-a-doodle-do of a rooster, who was perched in the tree right next to the stage, "singing" right on cue along with the musician; I also really liked hearing the roosters crowing every morning as a celebratory greeting to morning. At The Chicken Store, we entered the old house and walked right into the gift area. There were tee shirts, artwork, dish towels--everything chicken-related. We walked around the store for awhile and then followed the signs to The Chicken Lounge--which we assumed was another part of the gift shop. Upon entering The Chicken Lounge, we were faced with a sign that said, "Caution: Chickens Under Foot! Please Step Carefully!". The sign was no joke--there were chickens running amok all over the place! At first it was odd, but then it became really cool (at least to me). The cutest thing was an aquarium, outfitted with a little heat lamp, full of rescued baby chicks. They were SO cute! I enjoyed watching them stand there, with their little eyes slowly drooping, drooping, drooping and then finally giving into their mid-morning naps. Loved it! We also met one of the ladies that runs the rescue. She was super nice, albeit a little eccentric. The chickens that are rescued are rehabilitated (if needed) and then adopted out to caring chicken lovers. One of the chickens who was running around was named Easter. She is a favorite of the lady who runs the rescue group and Easter is actually getting ready to go to her new home in a couple of weeks. The lady told us that one of Easter's tricks is that she pecks at human's teeth. Kevin and I laughed uncomfortably, assuming that it was a joke. At this point, the lady picked Easter up, smiled a big, toothy-grin and let Easter peck between her teeth!
On our last morning there, we hung out at Duval House until check-out time, which was 11am. Our flight wasn't until around 4pm that afternoon, so our plan was to leave our luggage at Duval House and wander around the island until it was time to get a cab to the airport. You should know that Key West hasn't had any rain since Nov. 21, 2005 and the drought officially began to end at 11am, as soon as we'd given up our hotel room shelter! We were walking in the rain because apparently it's really difficult to ride a moped in the rain and so we got soaked to the bone. We decided to seek refuge at Sloppy Joe's, which was everyone else on the island's idea. It was a good, but wet and cold time!
Key West is a great place to go to do what we did--relax. We tossed around the idea of parasailing; renting a little boat and also going on a sunset cruise on a sailboat. That would have been really fun and maybe we can do some of those things next time. I think that the best thing about Key West is the pace of life: No one is in a hurry to get anywhere or do anything. It's a great change from most of our daily lives back at home, where we're ruled by our watches and appointments. Oh, and it's probably a good idea not to try and plan a trip down there during hurricane season...*last random Key West factoid of this blog post* In the past two hundred years, only 4 people have been killed as a result of a hurricane on the island of Key West. Surprising, huh?
Kevin and I went to Key West, Florida last weekend. In case you don't know, Key West is the Southern-most island off the coast (way off) of Florida. It's situated so that the West side of the island is on the Gulf of Mexico and the East side is on the Atlantic side. (See map) The water is a beautiful turquoise, clear blue.
We were able to fly, using some of Kevin's Continental miles, so we flew from Houston to Tampa, then (via the smallest plane I've been on in a long time) onto Key West. Since we flew directly onto the island, we didn't have to rent a car, which was the wisest decision we made. We took a cab from the airport to our hotel and from then on, we just walked everywhere or took our rented moped. The island is so small that a car really isn't necessary and parking is a pain anyway.
We stayed at a nice little bed and breakfast called Duval House. It is located right on the main drag of Key West, Duval street. We had a great room with a huge balcony, overlooking Duval street, which made for some interesting people watching, especially in the wee hours of the night, when the drunks were out and about. Duval house also has a nice pool that was wonderful to come back to, during the heat of day, to rinse off and float around in.
In all honesty, we didn't do a whole heck of a lot while in Key West. Typically, we'd get up every morning, go and grab a quick breakfast out by the pool at Duval House and then venture out to shop around or go to the beach (which is man-made, but really nice and clean). When it was time to eat, we'd venture down Duval Street to find a place to grab some grub and a drink (Hey, we were on vacation! It's totally acceptable to begin drinking at 11am--that's the rule!). We frequented an Irish pub called Irish Kevin's daily which is a guitar bar...similar to a piano bar, with a musician who plays silly songs and engages the audience in debauchery. On our first day in Key West, we were walking past Irish Kevin's, which is also sort of an open-air place. We were standing on the sidewalk outside, listening to the guitar player when, all of a sudden, what seemed like the entire audience turned around to us, out on the sidewalk and (along with the musician on his booming microphone) said, "COME ON IN!". We sheepishly took them up on the offer and grabbed a table. We came to learn that the whole "come on in" thing happens very frequently and it's also fun to be on the inside of the joke (and thus, inside the pub) when it happens. We also learned that typically the singer on stage will say something off color and rude about the people who choose not to come inside and run quickly down the sidewalk, embarrassed.
We also enjoyed Sloppy Joe's which is one of the oldest bars on the island and was one of Ernest Hemingway's favorite hangouts when he lived in Key West. We went to Willie T's, which had the best food, I think. We tried to eat at Margaritaville, just to say that we did (because we figured that everyone would ask us if we went there) but there was a wait for a table and we didn't feel like it was worth the wait. We didn't eat at The Hog's Breath Saloon but we enjoyed the atmosphere there.
Every evening we went down to Mallory Square, which is the premier place to watch the sunset. There are jugglers, artists, etc down there as well as some live music. The sunsets were beautiful and the vibe was really cool down there, with everyone there to celebrate the sunset.
As far as sight-seeing, the only thing that was written on my list with a Sharpie marker was to go to Hemingway House. The house is pretty but I mainly wanted to see the cats. I was so excited to walk onto the property and immediately see Charlie Chaplin walking around! He's the most-photographed cat at Hemingway House. We learned that about 50% of the 50-60 cats at Hemingway House are polydactyls (have extra toes). I thought it was really interesting to find out that most cats at Hemingway House live to be well over 20 years old! There's a vet that comes every Wednesday to check up on everyone; the cats' food is donated by Eukanuba and all but a few cats are spayed and neutered. The folks at Hemingway House like to have a couple of litters of kittens each year, to keep the population constant. While Kevin and I were walking around the grounds, we came upon an awful-looking cat, laying in the bushes. He was an orange tabby that couldn't have weighed more than 5 lbs or so. He was dirty, matted and flies and gnats were buzzing all around him. I had to watch his chest and belly carefully to make sure that he was breathing, because he looked like a really dead cat to me. My faith and excitement about the Hemingway cats was wavering. During our tour of the grounds with a tour guide, he took the time to talk about some of the cats that live there and introduce us to the ones that were tagging along on our tour. It was at this time that he told us about one of the oldest cats on the property (I can't remember his name), but he described him as an orange tabby who looked like he's lost a battle with a weedwacker and then been thrown in the pool--which perfectly described the poor, sad cat that we'd seen in the bushes. Turns out that this cat is around 25 years old, which would make him 140 in human years! The tour guide assured us that the cat isn't in any pain--just that he's in his twilight years and sleeps most of the time. This made me feel much better.
Another cool place that we'd heard about and wanted to see was The Chicken Store. There are tons of chickens that live on Key West. They've been there for hundreds of years and roam about freely. Most people in Key West tolerate the chickens, but many do not and want them eradicated from the island. The Chicken Store is run by people who rescue the chickens of Key West. All of the proceeds from The Chicken Store go to the care and upkeep of the chickens on Key West. I personally, loved seeing the chickens around the island. We saw one mother chicken, with her 3 little baby chicks following closely behind; at Hog's Breath, while sitting there listening to a great live musician, we heard the cock-a-doodle-do of a rooster, who was perched in the tree right next to the stage, "singing" right on cue along with the musician; I also really liked hearing the roosters crowing every morning as a celebratory greeting to morning. At The Chicken Store, we entered the old house and walked right into the gift area. There were tee shirts, artwork, dish towels--everything chicken-related. We walked around the store for awhile and then followed the signs to The Chicken Lounge--which we assumed was another part of the gift shop. Upon entering The Chicken Lounge, we were faced with a sign that said, "Caution: Chickens Under Foot! Please Step Carefully!". The sign was no joke--there were chickens running amok all over the place! At first it was odd, but then it became really cool (at least to me). The cutest thing was an aquarium, outfitted with a little heat lamp, full of rescued baby chicks. They were SO cute! I enjoyed watching them stand there, with their little eyes slowly drooping, drooping, drooping and then finally giving into their mid-morning naps. Loved it! We also met one of the ladies that runs the rescue. She was super nice, albeit a little eccentric. The chickens that are rescued are rehabilitated (if needed) and then adopted out to caring chicken lovers. One of the chickens who was running around was named Easter. She is a favorite of the lady who runs the rescue group and Easter is actually getting ready to go to her new home in a couple of weeks. The lady told us that one of Easter's tricks is that she pecks at human's teeth. Kevin and I laughed uncomfortably, assuming that it was a joke. At this point, the lady picked Easter up, smiled a big, toothy-grin and let Easter peck between her teeth!
On our last morning there, we hung out at Duval House until check-out time, which was 11am. Our flight wasn't until around 4pm that afternoon, so our plan was to leave our luggage at Duval House and wander around the island until it was time to get a cab to the airport. You should know that Key West hasn't had any rain since Nov. 21, 2005 and the drought officially began to end at 11am, as soon as we'd given up our hotel room shelter! We were walking in the rain because apparently it's really difficult to ride a moped in the rain and so we got soaked to the bone. We decided to seek refuge at Sloppy Joe's, which was everyone else on the island's idea. It was a good, but wet and cold time!
Key West is a great place to go to do what we did--relax. We tossed around the idea of parasailing; renting a little boat and also going on a sunset cruise on a sailboat. That would have been really fun and maybe we can do some of those things next time. I think that the best thing about Key West is the pace of life: No one is in a hurry to get anywhere or do anything. It's a great change from most of our daily lives back at home, where we're ruled by our watches and appointments. Oh, and it's probably a good idea not to try and plan a trip down there during hurricane season...*last random Key West factoid of this blog post* In the past two hundred years, only 4 people have been killed as a result of a hurricane on the island of Key West. Surprising, huh?
posted by Jenny | 10:24 AM
|
0 Comments
